A Strong 2013

It has been a big year at Hulu. I feel very fortunate to have stepped into a company that has such a strong team, showing such incredible performance. I’m humbled by the work that the team has done this year, and the focus that they have continued to demonstrate. I’m pleased to report the results of the team’s great efforts this year.

Revenue

Hulu will reach $1 billion in revenue in 2013. That’s up from $695 million in 2012. When you think about the fact that Hulu first launched out of beta in 2008, it’s quite an impressive feat to scale the business from zero to $1 billion over the course of just six years.

Hulu Plus

Earlier this year, we reached 5 million subscribers. Roughly 50% of those subscribers are now streaming exclusively on devices, with living room viewing accounting for over half of all content consumption on the service. Hulu Plus is now accessible on more than 400 million Internet connected devices in the U.S., including the all-new Xbox One, PlayStation®4, Chromecast, Nintendo 3DS and Windows Phone 8.* We also provided a refreshed and redesigned Hulu Plus experience on Apple TV, iPad, and millions of Samsung, Roku, and Wii devices. It is our goal to provide the best user experience possible on every device, so consumers can take their favorite TV shows with them on-the-go.

Content

We are continually adding to the content available on Hulu and Hulu Plus–this year, we grew our Hulu and Hulu Plus offerings to include premium programming from more than 488 content partners, providing over 86,000 TV episodes, 2,900 TV series, and 68,000 hours of video on Hulu and Hulu Plus (and growing).

Hulu Plus is the only online video subscription service that offers current season content from five of the six largest U.S. broadcast networks. Hulu users can watch seven of the top 10 TV shows in primetime, anytime and anywhere, including Modern Family, The Voice, The Blacklist, Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D., Scandal, Grey’s Anatomy, Sleepy Hollow and many more.**

We launched more than 20 Hulu Originals in 2013, and plan to double that number over the next few years. Shows like The Awesomes, Behind the Mask and The Wrong Mans performed extremely well on the service, and were among the top 10 most-watched shows on Hulu each week a new episode aired.

We were excited to bring you over 2,000 new episodes and 144 titles through a content deal with BBC Worldwide North America that includes internationally-beloved favorites like Doctor Who, Luther, Top Gear and Sherlock. Additionally, we added the first four seasons of the critically acclaimed drama The Good Wife to the Hulu Plus library as part of our multi-year licensing agreement with CBS. And your kids will be entertained for hours with the new content we added to the Hulu Kids hub from the Jim Henson Family TV Library, giving Hulu Plus the rights to more Jim Henson Family titles than any other video subscription service in the U.S., including Fraggle Rock. We also added classic titles from PBS Kids and Lionsgate including Sesame Street and Thomas & Friends, as well as Spanish-language kids programming.

We look forward to increasing our overall content offerings, and will continue to invest in last night’s TV, original first-run TV programming, and great library TV from the U.S. and other markets.

Advertising

In 2013, we saw our roster of advertisers expand to more than 1,000 brands–a 15% increase over last year. It was also a record year for consumption as Hulu viewers streamed more than 1 billion content videos in each quarter, and stayed with us for approximately 50 minutes per session in Q4. And throughout the year, Hulu remained #1 in engagement among top ad supported online video sites, and #1 in market share of all premium online video providers, maintaining our commitment to building the world’s most effective video advertising service and delivering industry-leading results for our advertising partners.

Hulu Japan

Hulu Japan is on track to end 2013 having more than doubled the number of subscribers from the beginning of this year. We now have over 50 content partners offering users more than 12,000 assets of TV dramas and movies, and Hulu is available on more than 90 million devices (PCs not included).

Team

Over the course of the year, we hired over 260 new team members. Currently, the Hulu team is 725 members strong; that’s nearly 20% growth in our employee base year-over-year. In the last two quarters alone, we added over 140 new hires. I’d like to thank the Hulu team for their incredible commitment and execution, evidenced by the company’s continued growth.

It’s exciting for me to see the continued growth of the business and be part of such a great team. As we scale the business in 2014, we will continue to invest in content, technology and people. 2014 will bring even more opportunity as we find new ways to grow the business from the strong foundation we have built. Thank you for being users and fans of Hulu–we couldn’t do it without you.

*Not including laptop and desktop computers.**Source: Nielsen NPM, October 2013.